Prevention

WVU students were right to report threat

Only one person can say — and he may not know, really — what would have ensued had police not arrested a West Virginia University student accused of threatening to engage in a shooting spree.

According to witnesses, the 21-year-old Preston County man made the threats during a class last Thursday at the WVU Health Sciences Center. “I honestly feel like going home and getting my gun and killing everybody,” he is alleged to have said.

Witnesses reported the comment to a WVU official, who went on up the ladder to the university’s Office of Student Conduct and Office of Student Life. They contacted police, who arrested the man.

WVU Police Chief W.P. Chedester said the man insisted he does not own a gun. He added that, “We don’t take any chances …”

The student was arraigned and released on $50,000 bond. He is not permitted on university property.

Making threats such as that the student allegedly uttered is a felony under West Virginia law. Those convicted can be sentenced to as much as three years in prison.

Was the student seriously considering an act of violence? Again, only he knows. Would he have actually carried out a shooting? Even he may not know the answer to that. Things said in the heat of the moment do not always lead to action.

But students who reported the threat were right to do so. In this day and age, there can be no doubt about that.

Police were right to make an arrest. Again, no doubt.

Perhaps at some time in the past, such talk could be ignored safely. Not now, however.

That is something anyone subject to hot-tempered outbursts ought to keep in mind.